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From my reading of the CNN broadcast, the inch per 5 minutes was too fast, but it then slowed.
The problem with water rising in an area is that it may seem like it is not "rising too fast" but there are distinct points at which water becomes first a nuscance, then an impediment and then an impassable barrier. Water can set back a
situation in terms of useful
technolgoy also. Shallow water impedes walking, deeper becomes a
risk to movement, and a little deeper and you cannot drive anything through it, thought it is still to shallow and impeded to use boats well. So it is fine for a distant viewpoint to say it is not really that much of a problem but even a little water spread out over a large large city means a LOT of water.
I am calling it a night, good luck to everyone and to you Brendan, hang in there, I will be back in the AM.
Thanks for the information, Brendan--you have been the most reliable and exhaustive source for information for the past 30+ hours. I am shocked that every other major news organization (print for sure--no cable here) is completely asleep tonight, and the one Brendan Loy is still awake and productive. I hope you get a few hours' worth of sleep so that you can keep bringing us valuable information with the sun tomorrow.
Goodnight, and prayers and best wishes to everyone along the Gulf Coast,
Heidi in Denver
How can the Army Corps fix a 200 foot levee breach spilling thousands of gallons a second without having vehicle access?
Maybe fill a couple C-130's with 200 tons of sandbags and then "bomb" them on top of the breach?
Deliberately sink a ship in Lake Poncthartrain? Sail up to the breach and dump a whole bunch of sand all at once?
This one will take some creativity, I'd imagine. Especially if they want to fix it quickly, which should be the imperative.
Incidentally, thanks to Brendan for helping allay my insomnia.
Thanks for bringing us such up-to-date info...you are tireless, it seems!
Praying for all those affected by this disaster...
Good Baton Rouge website for video. Links to almost 2 hours of aerial footage across the entire New Orleans area. http://www.wbrz.com
The fundamental problem with such a disaster -- clearing the bowl of New Orleans from water -- has been apparent for many years.
Whether that means it was never given the political expediency to come up with a solution or there is NO workable solution is a very troubling thought, either way.
An additional quandry is that it appears the current system of pumps and levies, with a levy breaking almost 12 hours after the disaster, may be dysfunctional altogether.
I would imagine the answer, and not at all a prompt one, will eventually be a patchwork of newly formed levies and perhaps strengthened pumps.
CNN.com's finally put up a bit of info on the break. http://www.cnn.com/2005/WEATHER/...rina/
index.html
The Baton Rouge stations currently have nothing, my guess is they went to automated systems and no one's awake to do anything.
Well, never mind. Army corps not going out to survey until tomorrow morning. They're not going to repair it for a long time, and it will likely require requisitioning equipment from other states.
This plan supposedly took a lot of brainstorming. Morons! Plug it now! Don't plan to survey!
It seems that the whole lake is going to empty out before they can do anything. Nuts.
On CNN, they were talking to an Army corps guy in Baton Rogue. He could only say there was a significant breach and they would be out to survey the situation at sunrise.
Seems like the best hope is a current fast enough to bring sediment from Pontchartrain to plug up the levee/canal, yet slow enough that the erosion under and to the sides of the breach can't keep pace with the buildup. Not sure if that is even possible. Again, prayers/miracles required.
The problem with trying to plug it now is that they don't know if they can get anyone in to plug it, and until daybreak, they won't be able to see the area well enough to tell if something can be done. Sending anyone in right now could very well be a suicide mission.
They can do nothing...
When a levee breaks like this there is nothing you can do but wait for the water level to become equal on both sides of the levee, only then can they can repair it and begin pumping the water out.
Also its not possible for and sediment to block it either, were talking about millions of gallons of water pouring from a 200 foot wide breach every minute here folks, if anything its just going to get bigger....
Looks like NO is pretty much screwed, which may be a good thing in the long run. They never should've built the damn city there in the first place, amazing it hasn't been wiped off the map yet.
Maybe they'll put it in a better spot this time...
It looks like the breach is right here:
http://www.topozone.com/map.asp?...7.000203789&
u=2
and
http://maps.google.com/maps?q=ne...08827&t=h&
hl=en.
It looks like it should be possible to plug the entrance to the canal, it which case they can worry about repairing the levy later.
Jesus you people need to get a clue...
There is nothing that they can do, this is not the movies people, you cannot plug canal entrances or levee breaks with ships, air dopped sand bags, or by dumping sand in the river. There is simply to much water moving to fast for any of that crap to work, never mind the fact that Katrina has dumped so much water in and around the area that any sort of transportation at all is either flat out impossible or slowed down to a crawl...
This is the real world and in the real world none of that crap will work at all and wastes valuable resources that could be put towards evacuting those hospital and the other people trapped in NO.
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